Trapped
by jaintn
Summary: After being abandoned by the Dominion, a group of marines holds out against the Zerg.
1. Chapter 1

Note: As far as the copywrite thing goes, I renounce.

**Trapped**

Dawn's coming. The first few rays of gray light seem like hope shining through what trees remain below my foxhole. Nothing I could say could describe the intensity and beauty of the experience after all we've been through holed up here in this rock. It's like everyone's always telling you to live each day like you might be gone the next; well, here we know each probably is going to be our last, which makes the intensity of these moments all the more gratifying.

I guess I'm starting to write all this down 'cause I don't have any kids of my own or much family either, for that matter, and it'd be nice to know someone somewhere might preserve this record of my existence for posterity, should humanity ever come this way again, or should it survive the planet-wasting nuclear barrage some of the others think is coming soon. (Though, I think if we were gonna get nuked, it'd have happened by now, but then again the Dominion's not what it used to be.)

Nothing can be done about that anyway, I should probably introduce myself at this point and tell you a little about our situation (for posterity, of course): My name is Harper Wigat, Harp for short, which the others call me 'cause they say I can make my Impaler sing like a harp (not that they're always a trustworthy group). Formerly, me and the others served as marines for the Dominion, about which I'll have more to say later. When our forces got wiped out by the Zerg, I and few other survivors managed to get away from the slaughter. Of course, the Dominion abandoned all its forces on the surface when it became apparent the cause was lost. Now, we survive as best we can in a fortress we constructed in a small rock knoll. When or if we'll get out of here nobody knows.

The old rock as we call it ain't much to look at, but it's been defensibe enough to keep the critters at bay up 'til now. The basic layout of our defenses allows us to project firepower in all directions fairly easily, which is necessary when you've get a pack of Hell's dogs coming in from all directions screaming their weird insect cries. We've got our one salvaged artillery piece on top of the knoll, so that it can fire in all directions. Beneath that, you've got two rows of foxholes (one of which I'm in now), where individuals pick off anything that survives the mortars and the big gun. And if we need it, we can roll out a couple of heavy caliber gauss cannons that can get through the thickest of Zerg hides easily.

Inside the rock we've got a nice little base set up. We managed to salvage a good supply of food, ammo, and equipment from when we served the Dominion, which we used to etch out the small cave network in the knoll. It's not cozy or anything, but we've got space enough to manufacture the new munitions we need to keep on fighting in addition to living space.

Our little group of survivors has been in the rock for about four months now. During that time, we've killed more Zerg and different kinds of Zerg than anyone can count. They attack any old time, night, day, whenever, and seemingly without reason.

Last time they came through here was a couple of days ago, a perfect example of how crafty non-sentient creatures can be. Our spotter up on the crest of the rock caught sight of a pack of about thirty of the critters coming our way. They were just charging right in this time, not that they always do that.

Of course, we've cleared most of the vegetation away for about half a kilometer in all directions, like any good military outfit would do around their fortification. On this particular occasion, artillery and mortars cut loose just as soon as they could site in (we're quick about that after all the practice we've had). It was a good shot, hit right up in front of them, blasting several to pieces in a cloud of dirt and flame. Undeterred, they ran on looking like a flock of demented looking bunny rabbits hopping at about 100kph. We opened fire when they were within a couple hundred meters, pretty much annihilating the first row of the buggers, but, as usual, they're resilient and had a little trick of their own they were about to spring.

They'd formed a tight formation, so that while the first few took it hard, those following behind were protected from the fire.

Lanz and Tolson had rolled out the anti-air guns by this point, and the heaver caliber weapon caused 'em to scatter when it hit, blasting through the first row to the one behind. They were scurrying in all directions. Bad news, 'cause now they were so close they couldn't easily be killed individually before they over ran our first row foxholes.

I got two of 'em coming my way pretty easy, and Lanz and Tolson got three more, but not before the last one had jumped into Bard's foxhole. The little sucker got him, stuck an arm-scythe in the gut and then about half cut his head off with the other. Lanz and Tolson brought everything to an end a moment later when they turned the critter to mist with a few shells from their guns.

Losses like that are felt deeply around here, not just 'cause we don't have any replacements for our casualties, but because we've grown pretty tight around here since the Dominion abandoned us, which is kinda weird considering marines aren't the most cultured type of person you might run across. There's about fifty of us left at this point. We're fighting on and hoping we can suck enough knowledge out the tech. manuals we salvaged to get deep space communications working.

That should give you a pretty good idea of our situation. It's time for me to get some shut-eye after keeping watch all night. Sleep's a dark and dangerous thing 'cause we're all worked to the bone defending this place, but it beats reality hands down any day we're here.

That's all for now, here's to hope and, failing that, posterity.


	2. 2nd Entry

**Second Month, 7:58PMT**

Just woke up after sleeping for a night, and thought I'd take a look at what I'd written yesterday. Kinda short and not enough detail I'd say. I'll have to try to remedy that as I keep going. The problem with me's that once I get started I can't hardly keep up with the ideas I'm thinking, and so I get about half of one thing written before I start writing the next. Guess that comes from not having much education and years spent working jobs that don't do too much to emphasize my writing skills. Heh, my former captain would think that one's kinda funny.

Anyway, if this is any indication, it looks like I'm gonna continue this thing instead of letting it slip like so many of my other projects -- well, like the stuff I used to try before I joined up with the marines.

So, I'm sitting in the sleeping area of our rock now. It's a big hollowed out place, roughly rectangular in shape. The work was done in a couple of days with the robotic spades we salvaged from the abandoned Dominion stockpiles. The ceiling and walls show the scalloped furrows of amateur work, but we got the floor right, which is what counts if one wants a good nights rest.

Scattered about are the few personal possessions any of us have left. Not much at all, just a few old lockets, photos, and the odd trinket. There was more, of course, back at base, but all that got left behind when we shipped out here to fight. About all I've got left of my previous life is a hunk of quartzite on a steel chain. It's about three centimeters in diameter, and it's not polished or anything, just kinda mounted as-is right out of the quarry from which it came. It don't mean that much, really; it was a stocking-stuffer one year at Christmas, but it was the most portable ting I could find when I shipped out. I don't even know why I've kept it all these years.

It's unusual the amount of variety one can find in the lucky charms that marines keep. For instance, Taylor and Munford both have the standard lucky rabbits-foot (synthetic 'cause, of course, rabbits didn't make the journey with us to the Koprulu sector). But others have feather necklaces, decks of cards. or even the famous shot glass of Tom Birque.

Says he kept the shot-glass as a souvenir of rough night of drinking on Tarsonis. Stories kinda funny: it's him and three of his buddies cruising through the slums of the former capital city. After a few hours of wandering, they end up in this seedy bar on the edge of town (and, no, I don't think the whole place is a big slum like some of the former SoK boys will tell you) when a hoover-bike gang parks their vultures out front and comes in to wet their whistles.

Despite the already already shady nature of the place, these boys managed to scare out most of the other customers. It turned out they were members of the Desperadoes, who had a real nasty rep. Ol' Tom and his buddies didn't feel like moving on, though. They'd decided this was going to be their last watering hole of the evening, Desperado thugs or not. So they just kept right on going, talking about old times back on Brontes and whatnot. Needless to say, they had some previous experience in similar situations.

Just when they'd begun to think the evening was going to end without any trouble, one of the Desperadoes comes over to Birque and his buddies, and says, "If you boys want to stay here, you're going to have to earn your places."

Several of the other Desperadoes came over to the table at this point. Bets were placed, glasses, liquor bottles were produced, and the drinking contest began. Now Birque and his buddies are stout marine types that know their way around a bottle -- even if it was Tarsonian synthahol -- which has been used as an antiseptic by certain military outfits not only because of its effect on bacteria but its taste as well. As Birque tells it, at this point he and his buddies weren't entirely sure what they were in for, as they'd already downed quite a few beers by this point and weren't sure whether they could handle the stronger stuff at this point.

At first they tried to back out, but the Desperadoes that had gathered round the table made it clear that leaving now would mean a fight, which, being outnumbered by about twenty metal and leather clad Desperadoes, didn't seem like a good option at that time. And, besides, there's nothing wrong with a marine doing some heavy drinking every now and then, is there?

The first shots of the clear, tepid liquor were placed on the table after the Desperadoes had finished placing their bets. Birque remembers the diversity of looks among the gang at this point: the man with a beard but no teeth, the black guy with a bad facial scar, the thin guy with a shaved head and earring. All of those fellows were standing around the table that all of a sudden had become the evening's entertainment for the gang.

Birque remembers the first shot as it went down, tasting like warm, bitter water. It produced a powerful burning sensation. Up in the nose, along the lining of the throat, and in the back of his mouth fibers clenched and contracted and nerves that don't get frequently exercised suddenly reported intense pain. Down in his stomach there was a small revolt too, as the new guy in town made space for himself by shoving all the other current guests aside in a way that felt most unpleasant to Birque. For their part, the three Desperadoes that were involved in the contest didn't look like they were handling the Tarsonian liquor much better.

The Desperadoes standing around the table kept up with their laughing and horseplay, while one of 'em poured the next round. Birque describes the effect of the liquor at this point as having a kind of clarifying effect on his mind. Despite what he knew the alcohol should be doing, by his account, Birque felt like somehow the new alcohol had counteracted the previous alcohol. And he seemed to be seeing the contest from an entirely sober perspective. He thought he might be able to win it with this second wind as the night passed and the group kept downing shots of synthahol.

At least, that's the way things seemed until he and his two buddies woke up the next afternoon, stripped naked and dumped in the alley beside the tavern. There was no sign of any of the Desperadoes or of any of his or his friends personal possessions. The only memento he had of the evening was a shot-glass stuck in one of his hands, which he could only assume was the one he'd been drinking out of last night, through his blurry vision and skull-cracking hangover. To this day, Birque's not sure whether the glass was some sort of sign that he won the contest, which isn't likely because they would've left some of the betting money as well; or whether it's a trinket to remind him of the humiliation of the loss he and his buddies faced as they tracked down new clothes and money; or just some sort of weird symbol of brotherhood -- like, hey, you drank with the Desperadoes and only ended up naked, passed out, and in the alley next to the establishment where that occurred. Strangely, neither of his two buddies had been left with their drinking glass.

The stories I could tell about myself lack any sort of action or drama like that, at least, before I joined the marines they did. Just to give you a brief run down of my history, let me tell you that I grew up in a small mining colony set up one one of the moons of Moria. Because it was a small, atmosphere-controlled environment, only several hundred miners and their families occupied the place at any one time. Without human intervention, life would not have been possible on the moon, which was why I spent most of my childhood staring at a barren, crater-filled landscape through the portholes in one of the domes, and only wanting one thing: to get the hell out of what I thought of as the most boring place in space any way possible.

The thing I remember most acutely about the colony was that the atmosphere was so oppressive because of the poor air filters which left quite a bit of the rock dust and soot in the closed environment from the mining activities. It'd get caught up in your lungs any time you did any exercise whatsoever, and the local medical facility couldn't stock enough breathing masks and pure oxygen to treat all the lung problems everyone had. Most of the miners up there developed severe lung disorders and needed various genetic/regenerative therapies every ten years or so. Luckily, I was one of those that made it out of there with the same pair of lungs I started with, unlike several of the other children who developed severe forms of silicosis in just a few years.

There was just a small group of us mining brats up there, and we all went to a school set up by the combine. It had to be one of the poorest educational experiences anyone ever had. We were like after thoughts, being so far removed from the mainstream of society. Our education seemed to consist mostly of mining related topics, part of some company project to have a group of knowledgeable recruits available to work at similar such lousy facilities elsewhere, I suppose. Of course, we did have our one egghead that went on to oversee the combines planetary operations on some small planet somewhere, kinda surprised me when I heard that 'cause I didn't get the impression any of us had any bright future ahead of us when we were in school.

My family life was both severe and tender as seems to be the case with most mining families. At an early age, I already knew the strict discipline a tired miner father would enforce when I acted up, but I also knew the love of a mother who would always try to find ways to soften up the mining life.

That's really about all I care say about it. It was a loving, good family, and I have nothing but fond memories of them. For the most part, I'd say it was a good child, but once I hit my teens I was just counting the days until I could get away from that backwater mining facility and do something, anything.

As far as I know both my parents died on that godforsaken moon after being worn out by years of intense labor and living in such unhealthy conditions. But I don't really know 'cause I haven't heard from them since I finally managed split town when I was sixteen, lying about my age so that I could join up with Kel-Morian armed forces as a marine.

Anyway, enough with the reminiscing and nostalgizing. I've got a entombment to get to.

**16:58, Same Day**

I just got back from Bard's entombment, and it's almost time for me to stand watch again.

That's one cool thing about this situation, when you die you get a really big time funeral. Evelyn Wu, one of the officers to make it with us, refers to these ceremonies as "fit for a pharaoh" (who were apparently these ancient Earth emperors or kings or some such). Because we've got a surplus of equipment and most of us are familiar with the "anonymous acres" places marines usually end up getting buried in, if they get buried at all, we go all out here for the funerals. Everyone (while there's enough of us left at any rate) gets a six by twelve tomb for him dug out of the rock face of the knoll in which he is buried with all the pomp and ceremony we can muster. With a several ton rock slab protecting them, a soldier can be sure of an uninterrupted eternal slumber -- as they should be.

Not counting that raid yesterday, the Zerg have been keeping their distance recently. Not like when we first got here -- seemed like we were fighting every half an hour then, but when we managed to fortify out position and held out against the initial onslaught, things started to calm down.

That's all for now.


	3. One Week Later

**One Week Later**

Maybe it's the light. It's later in the day, so the shadows are longer and maybe that's making the slaughter pit I'm looking into look much worse than it actually is, though I doubt it. I've never seen anything like it (not that I go looking around after a battle's over with much), a good six meter wide crater in the earth, probably created by a tank's artillery shell, filled with the flesh-eaten corpses of humans and zergs all pawing and crawling over each other as if trying to get away. . .

Let's just say it's an unfortunate sight that even a vet like me wishes he'd never seen.

I'd like to think it's the worst I'll see out here, but I'm not ready to concede that point just yet. The scars of the battle the Dominion fought with the zerg extend for kilometers in every direction: busted bunkers, exploded tanks and gollies, and a whole lot of rotting corpses -- both zerg and ours, all being slowly covered over by new vegetation. So who knows what other tidbits of gore are out there awaiting my discovery.

Maybe instead of dwelling on how horrible all this is, I'll just focus on why we're here, that'll probably make a better story. And, yeah, I know I said I'd keep the updates plentiful and timely last time, but I think it works better this way 'cause I'll have more to say.

Where to begin? Well, let's see. The day after Bard's entombment we got hit by a small group of mutalisks, about five of 'em. They must've been out patrolling or something like that when they stumbled across us.

I remember most distinctly the feeling of being totally exposed, as I lay in my foxhole in broad daylight, watching them circle overhead.

Once they'd taken notice of us, they shot a few of their glave wurms into the rock face of the knoll, probably trying to hit our artillery up top, but they ended up missing, distracted by we below who had started firing at them.

From there, it was the usual routine: Lanz and Tolson rolled out the heavy artillery and everyone else let loose when they were able.

Once the fighting had begun, the birdies homed right in on the big gun, and took it out with a concentrated attack. Luckily, Lanz and Tolson didn't get hurt, but the gun's a total loss until it can be repaired. While that was going on, I and most of the other sentries got a number of good shots dropping all but two of them.

The remaining pair happened to swoop down on Marcus, who was holding down the fox two down from mine. And they hit him hard, not a killing blow, but he was down and writhing from the injuries. Like we're trained to do, me and Lankasar tried to get over to provide some cover and protection for Marcus, but he did take another good lick before we could get there.

The mutas at this point were flying around real fast, swooping in to take shots at close range and using their quickness to avoid return fire. Lankasar and I went on one knee facing in opposite directions by Marcus to try and intercept them, as the medical team scrambled down from the cave entrance and started running our way.

Let me tell you, those suckers are ugly. I'd never seen one up close before, but when it dived in, I got a good look at the crusty saliva on its snout, with its beady little animal eyes set back on its head, and those veiny, gross looking bat-wings. Getting such a close look at such a nasty beast doesn't come without its penalties, however. I got a nice ricochet would on my stomach about kidney high. I can only thank the one of the snipers up on top of the knoll for making one heck of a shot that the wound wasn't much worse, 'cause one of 'em made a nice shot that knocked the creature to the ground, where it flopped about angrily until a few good shots put it out of its misery, right before it got off its final glave wurm, the one that burrowed about a quarter-inch into my stomach after ricocheting of the lip of the fox.

The bottom line of the incident for me was that I got to spend a few days working in our small factory while my injury healed. Marcus came out fine too. We've got the "good medicine" here, as it's usually called, so we can heal pretty much any injury that comes along no matter how severe. It's also reassuring to know that two of the women with us are trained medics.

Anyway, I enjoyed the change of pace and having a good, solid stone roof over my head after having spent so many days and nights in the unprotected foxhole.

To give you a brief description of the our little manufacturing plant, let me say that it was cut out of the solid stone just like our sleeping area. We've got four tables in various states of disarray set up in there. Two of 'em are reserved for ammo manufacturing, that's where me and Kurtz worked, and the other two are where our resident techie, Burnitz, tries, usually in vain, to build the devices we don't have but need.

Injured cases get sent to work in the shop while their recovering because no one around gets any real down time. We've got to stay vigilant 'round the clock if we want to live. That said, there's something strangely therapeutic about the environment. It has to do with the company 'cause the work's just tedious (any soldier that doesn't know how to reload spent cartridges won't be around long, that's for sure).

Kurtz represents what happens when the "good medicine" gets there too late: he's missing three of his limbs and has bad scarring over what's left. The story: his squad mate dragged him, full of hydra spines and covered in acid, to where our group was deserting when we were deserting. But by the time we could bring him the "good medicine" a day later when we were in transit to what would become our new base, it was too late, resulting in his current condition. If it bothers him any, he doesn't let on. He's one of the funniest and most talkative people around here, which takes away from the tedium of working in the shop. Kurtz is one-half of the therapeutic aspect of that work environment.

The other half is Burnitz, and for exactly the opposite reason. He never says anything to you, though he does talk all day long. Only he talks to himself, curses, actually, at the devices which he is trying to fix up, which he's no good at 'cause he's basically just a half-educated marine like me and most everyone else around here. We gave him the job 'cause he'd put in a coupla hundred hours as a mechanic servicing tanks and whatnot, so he's had to try and teach himself how to put stuff together from the components and manuals we have.

Burnitz's odd monologue created an interesting backdrop for the conversations Kurtz and I would be having. As in, we'd be talking about the codo wrestling champions for the past few years (for those who don't follow it, codo wrestling's basically all-in boxing) when Burnitz would disrupt our talk with a short exclamation to the effect that the machine he was working on was small and of illegitimate heritage. He repeated that line frequently, seeming to be quite fond of it, he used it on just about every gadget he worked on.

There was just something funny about the whole situation, being out in the middle of nowhere talking about sports and listening to Burnitz cuss to high heaven. Between the two, you stayed entertained all day long, and it took your mind off of all the tension of endless nights of guard duty. . . and being stuck out in the middle of nothing.

On the last day of my time down there, I was setting fuses in artillery shells and carrying on my usual jawing with Kurtz. I think we were talking about the finer points of codo take-downs and who had the best one or something like that when suddenly one of the comm. devices Burnitz'd been working came to life. It wasn't tuned properly, but a few phrases did come through ungarbled.

". . . position N010-0205. . . W. . .-0180-124. . . need . . . zerg. . . alone. . . support. . . over."

"Sweet Lady of the Lake," Burnitz said, staring at the device as if the blinking lights and panels on the suddenly functional device represented some kind of manifestation of the divine.

Me and Kurtz were dumbfounded too, just sat staring at the thing waiting for its next pronouncement as devout followers might.

"Repeat. . . position. . . zerg. . . alone. . . ," our oracle suddenly spoke.

Burnitz came out of his trance this time around and tried to respond. Toggling the communicate switch on the device, he asked whoever it was to identify himself. Unfortunately, whoever it was didn't respond or communicate any further. All we heard was static blasting through the speaker. Trying other stations had the same results.

After fooling with the device for a while, Burnitz turned to us and said, "Well, what the heck do you make of that?"

Kurtz kind of smiled and responded, "probably swamp gas or ionizing radiation or a glitch, something like that sucking in a transmission from somewhere else. Lord knows we're the only ones here, unless the Dominion tries to wipe out the zerg here again, but then all our comm. devices would be going crazy if a landing was going on. . ."

"This is local communications only. Anything we heard had to have originated on this planet somewhere," Burnitz interjected.

"I believe I heard some lat/long coordinates somewhere in there," I said.

"I got that too," Burnitz said, "maybe I can use the playback to help us figure out what they were."

Kurtz thought all this was amusing. "You do that," he said sarcastically, "what are we going to do about it even if you did finally manage to fix one of those contraptions and that someone out there actually was trying to communicate with someone.

"I mean even if they were only two hills over, we'd be nuts to go looking for them with the zerg out there.

"We're better off if we just act like it was some sort of glitch or something. Ain't nothing we can do, is there?"

Burnitz was teed about the insult to his abilities, "Look man, if you think you can get this stuff working be my guest," he said, gesturing to the pile of parts and scrap on his tables.

"Let's just keep this quiet," Kurtz replied, "we got something good here, don't we? No crazy wars to fight, no commanders to answer to, no crazies fighting with you or against you. The zerg, they don't care about us. We'd be dead otherwise. I think we can all agree on that one.

After pausing, in a conciliatory tone, "And you know you're the only one around here that can fix that stuff, except maybe Evie, and she's tied up making sure everything runs smooth around here, her and Downes."

All Burnitz said in response was that he'd think about it.

Kind of a strange moment there, it seemed like old Kurtz was scared about leaving or maybe getting left behind (which we wouldn't do, unlike a lot of mercenary outfits). I didn't want to take sides 'cause I hadn't had any time to think about it. Looking back on it now, maybe I should have, but hindsight's twenty/twenty, right?

That night at mess, Burnitz did, of course, bring up the transmitter. Said he was of the opinion that someone else might be out there or there must be another settlement or military base, and that we needed to try and establish contact with them.

Evie, being her usual whip smart self, told him to, by all means, establish communications and pursue it, anything to get us out of here would be great.

"I can't do it with what I've got here," Burnitz replied. "It's the antenna's we have. They don't have the range to do what we need. The partial coordinates we heard were way up north of here, and it'd be a miracle if we can establish firm communication with them with the smaller antennas we have here."

Now that really put Evie out. You could tell by the look on her face. "So when were you planning on telling us that. What the heck've you been up to for the past month if we need a bigger antenna."

Burnitz just shrugged. "I'm doing my best. You and everyone else know I'm not, strictly speaking, qualified to do what you're asking me to do."

"Well, start working on it then."

"It's just that we don't have some of the components here. The only place I can think of that would have them is back at the outpost."

"The one we saw wiped out and destroyed before we deserted."

Burnitz screwed up his face at that last remark. "Well, yeah. Where else?"

"And if the antenna was destroyed by the zerg when they destroyed everything else?"

"It's our best shot."

"And if we get the antenna, you're going to get our communications up and running for sure?"

"Well, yeah," Burnitz said, unsure of himself.

This set off a debate of everyone at the mess. Most seemed to be of the opinion that we'd be better off ignoring the whole thing. Nobody likes the idea of wandering back out into the wilderness for any extended period of time. We can fight the zerg on our terms here, but out there all the advantages swing their way, even in small numbers.

And nobody thought Burnitz could live up to his word on getting communications up no matter what we did.

Everyone at the table started jawing with each other about it, quite a commotion for out usually sedate group. Our two unofficial leaders, Evelyn Wu and Charles Downes, didn't weigh in at first. They just listened to the debate going on.

It was pretty heated, everybody talking at once to their neighbors and just into space too. The arguments came down for the most part into two camps: on the one hand, the majority was in favor of not risking an expedition and staying here in our modest utopia, away from the military and not at much risk from the zerg; on the other, a few people, Evelyn and myself included, didn't want to spend the rest of our lives here and even if the antenna wasn't a great chance, it was better than our other options.

She said, "We're safe here for now, but the future's unsure."

And that pretty much settled it, or it settled it enough that me, Burnitz, and the few others brave or stupid enough to argue for returning to the old battlefield were given permission to do so. There were a few other odds and ends Burnitz was hoping to get while we were there, and some of the others wanted to check around for some of the munitions we couldn't make, guided missiles, etc., here at out base. So that provided some extra impetus as well.

I don't have to tell you we made it 'cause you already know. The journey was, of course, uneventful. We set out in the APV we'd used to transport all the equipment to our base when we fled and got here in a couple of days.

To arrive at this stark reminder of where we came from.


End file.
